OPEN ↠ FALSE GODS, GREAT DEMONS (OPEN LOG 1)

[faderifting]

WHO: Living Residents of the Horrible Future
WHAT: Ah ha ha ha stayin' alive, stayin' alive.
WHEN: ALTERNATE FUTURE, 1-15 Cloudreach 9:48
WHERE: Anywhere, but especially Orzammar
NOTES: This is the first open log for False Gods, Great Demons. Anything that happened prior to Cloudreach 9:48 should go on the flashback meme. Most members of the TTT and their friends in Kirkwall will be arriving in Orzammar on approximately Cloudreach 7. In the meantime, feel free to make your own adventures. If you want to blow up an bridge, assassinate an NPC of your own invention, steal supplies, or anything else--it's all yours, go for it!

SOUTHERN THEDAS is a wasteland. The Blight crawling across the Orleian countryside and into Ferelden leaves nothing alive in its wake, scarring the land like an insatiable fire until no birds sing and the only things that grows is the Red Lyrium that speckles cliff sides and crawls up dying trees until they look like rows of jagged bloody teeth. And where it's still green, where people can still survive, the atmosphere is nearly as stifling. Every city and settlement is watched over by a Venatori or trustworthy collaborator. Those who don't keep their heads down and their dissent a whisper may vanish without warning. They may take their whole families with them. There are flashes of hope--an assassinated lordling here, a village rousing itself to brief and doomed rebellion there--but for every man the Imperium loses, they seem to find two to take his place.

NORTHERN THEDAS is at war. The worst of it doesn't reach west into Tevinter or the Anderfels; the line between the Qunari and the Imperium is drawn straight through Antiva, with Nevarra and Rivain on either side quiet and calm as only lands under martial law can be. The Free Marches vary between complacency and rebellion, but the rebellious ones risk ruin--there are murmurs it won't be long before a whole city is made an example. A steady stream of desperate refugees is fleeing north to the Qun, but plenty are picked off and punished as traitors before they can cross into Qunari-controlled territory. Your best best for a clean escape are the pirates who still hold Llomerynn free from both sides of the conflict.

ORZAMMAR is the only kingdom in Thedas that looks much the same--and Kal-Sharok, but they're not accepting outsiders. The heavy doors at Orzammar's entrance are sealed and guarded, as much against the steady flow of refugees asking for help as against the Venatori. The refugees are turned away. There's no way to know who can be trusted, and even if there were, there's not food enough for people who can't fight. Orzammar Thaig is still the dwarves' home--though with stealing shrinking numbers and poor prospects, King Bhelen has been amenable to allowing casteless surfacers some leeway--but the once-abandoned Ortan Thaig is the Inquisition's. Quietly. The only things stopping a full assault on Orzammar is the Venatori's need for dwarf-mined lyrium and the plausible deniability that the Inquisition's remaining rebel bands are using the Deep Roads with Bhelen's consent.

An hour's walk through caves and deepstalker swarms, Ortan is a city in its own right. A crammed city, one where cots and bunk beds crammed into shared housing are the norm no matter how important someone is and you occasionally have to protect your dinner from a restless, swooping griffon, but one where you can still find a pint of ale or a game of cards if you've time to waste on them. It's just that not many people do. There's the watch to keep; the tunnels that creep further into the deep teem with darkspawn who are held back at barricades, while the hidden, narrow tunnels that lead to the surface are watched at all hours so anyone coming or going can be identified. There are weapons to forge and sharpen. Plans to make. Bands to lead. Maybe you weren't a leader five years ago, but these days, there aren't that many people with more than five years' experience still alive to give orders. Fewer every week.

And so we burned. We raised nations, we waged wars,
We dreamed up false gods, great demons
Who could cross the Veil into the waking world,
Turned our devotion upon them, and forgot you.
Threnodies 1:8

Comments

[unbrokenoath]

To her credit, she looks worried when he complains, pulling away from him to check him over. Oh, right, he wasn't just off taking a vacation. Rolling off of Alistair and settling next to him instead, Kaisa gives him another once-over. The furrowed brows says that she isn't real pleased with what she sees. People have come out plenty worse, of course, but--it's never easy.

Other than the worry that she may have accidentally broke Alistair a little, Kaisa looks blissfully unaware of what he's talking about, cocking her head to the side. "What, did we get more necromancers? Hate those guys. You're all finished killing a dude and then he pops back up and starts wandering around. If I wanted him to do that, I wouldn't have killed him, now would I?" There's a pause, and gears shifting in her head. "--That's not what you mean, is it."

[byblow]

The babbling is nice. Alistair stays where he is, lying on the floor, to listen to it—to Kaisa still being Kaisa, when everyone else is dead or gone or different. Even him, sometimes.

"No," he says, but now he's reluctant to explain, and ruin it. Talk necromancy to me more, baby. But, as stated, he's different. None of that now. He shoulders his way through the reluctance—albeit while lying back down flat on the floor and staring up at the ceiling of the cavern—and says, "Teren is back."

And other people, but she's the important one they have in common.

[unbrokenoath]

"You're shitting me."

But he isn't. Even if this were back in the old days, when Alistair was far more prone to shitting people, that's not something that he would ever joke about. Teren was dead. The Wardens had held a memorial service for her, just like they've had to do for so many other shield brothers and sisters. Alistair wouldn't make an idle joke about such a painful memory.

After a few thoughtful moments of studying the ground, she turns back to Alistair, her expression changing from incredulous to dumbfounded. "She's alive? How? It's been five years, Alistair, what has she been doing?" Kaisa can't say that she knows Teren well--who can?--but it still seems incredibly unlike her to just. Disappear for years and decide to show back up out of the blue.

[byblow]

"They say they came straight here," Alistair says. "All of them—everyone who disappeared with her is here, too. The Venatori caught them in Haven. It's like no time passed for them at all."

So. There's that. He sits up finally, adjusts his clothes and rubs his face, and gives Kaisa a faint smile-slash-grimace.

"I haven't talked to her. Not much."

[unbrokenoath]

The idea of Teren and the entire team that had been with her showing up after five years, alive and with no memory of that time span...It's hard for Kaisa to wrap her head around. She sits back, stunned expression facing the ground.

"Is that even possible? That's some kind of magic, right? I've never heard of time magic." It sounds...like a bad idea, honestly. Being able to meddle in time. One slip, and you could do more damage than an army. But--time to focus. Weird time bullshit or no, Teren was back.

"Well. That's good, isn't it? That she's back. How often do we get to hear that people we thought were dead are actually alive? We should--we should do something." A party is a little out of the question, but surely they can figure something out. She flashes Alistair a bright smile, and reaches over to ruffle his hair. "I've got you and Teren back. We gotta do something."